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Gates on Google
EnsignExtra writes " A long and interesting article in Fortune on the battle between Gates and Google. 'Forced to watch Google's stock soar the way Microsoft's used to, and Brin and Page enjoy their roles as tech's new rock stars, Gates brings to the fight a ferocity that nobody has seen since the Netscape war a decade ago. Their popularity gets under his skin. "There's companies that are just so cool that you just can't even deal with it," he says sarcastically, suggesting that Google is nothing more than the latest fad, adding, "At least they know to wear black."...Trying to build a Google killer, however, has turned out to be truly humbling for Microsoft.'"
Of course Bill (and Microsoft) are going to hate Google; they are after all competitors in the search industry. What, do you really except them to sit down and play a game of checkers?
Well, if Microsoft hadn't built up an AOL-like overdone presence with their MSN web portal, maybe people wouldn't be sick of M$. I go to Google for the refreshing simple-ness.
Always going forward, 'cause we can't find reverse.
If Microsoft would innovate, instead of copy, then Gates would not have to be envious of Google's success and coolness.
I hope Google expands into areas that generate revenue while competing directly against MS - that will put pressure on MS and hopefully bring down cost and maybe even improve quality.
BP http://www.card-central.com
Confidence ran high. A senior Microsoft executive said the top brass thought the fight against Google "was going to be Netscape all over again."
*Chuckle*
"I remember when [Payne's team] showed off their first prototype in early 2004--people laughed because it was so much like Google," says a former Microsoft executive. "We had copied them. That's not how you lead."
Hmm..isnt that how they led with XP, copying Aqua?
One reason Google has been rolling out so many new or improved products is that Schmidt understands that innovation is the only sure edge Google has. The moment Google allows itself to slow, Microsoft could overwhelm it.
This is the reason why Odds are stacked so high up against companies such as Google or Apple. All their success depends on their ability to innovate constantly and continuously, that any letup will cost them both users and provide enough leverage for competitors to one_up them.
"Microsoft can play its old game to compete with Linux and Apple. It has to play Google's game to compete with Google."
And that sums it all. Google has proven to Microsoft that they cant compete on the same level. Microsoft has bureaucratic issues that needs to be resolved in terms of its size and the products it push through, and in their direction. Google has its own such as growing pains, the push to constantly innovate and the drive to outlast a cash cow ten times bigger.
Rapid Nirvana
Gates says that when Microsoft is done integrating search into future versions of Windows and Office, the world will look back at the way we are now "Googling" for stuff on the Internet and laugh. "The idea that you type in these words [in the search box] that aren't sentences and you don't get any answers--you just get back all these things you have to click on--that is so antiquated," he says, later adding, "We need to take search way beyond how people think of it today and just have it be naturally available, based on the task they want to do." For example, if you wanted to look up a factoid while you were writing a document, you might search for it without ever leaving Word.
It seems to me that the high-ups at MS are completely out of touch with the real world nowadays. This quote from Gates is just like all their recent releases comparing Longhorn to Tiger.. their perception of what MS's products offer is way inflated from what they actually do, and they seem to be persuading themselves that empty promises of what a future product will do is somehow better than a product which is available here and now, today.
Is there anyone outside of MS that thinks they have the slightest chance of beating Google at the search technology game? Google are far closer to natual language searching than any of MS's efforts, and comparing past trends of how MS promises stack up against reality, I think we can all be sure that by the time MS gets anywhere close to what they're promising here, the competition are going to be offering searching by telepathy from within Duke Nukem Forever.
Did you notice that Google appeared on Gates's radar screen when he read their job ads, and saw they were looking for the same sorts of folks as him? That told him they were looking to compete.
I first saw Paul Graham mention this -- he would read the job ads of his competitors. If he saw C++, Oracle, etc. then he knew the people didn't matter (and wouldn't matter).
If he saw Perl, Python, etc. he took notice. [He never saw Common Lisp, of course]
Graham's said that no matter what Mar-Com (marketing communications) bozos have to say, the job ads tell the real story.
http://www.thebricktestament.com/the_law/when_to_
Does anyone else remember the days when Slashdot ranted daily against the privacy-violating evil of Doubleclick cookies?
Well, what google is doing is DoubleClick *10^100, and everyone's hunkydory with it because they *might* help runner-ups like OpenOffice or Firefox become more popular by morphing them into data collection mechanisms. (Which itself is an ironic business model for "free as in freedom software".)
Anyway, don't kid yourselves. Google is really an advertisement vendor -- their customers are increasingly ad agencies and big corporations. They want this data to build consumer profiles on you (and probably governmental profiles too), which they will sell in one form or another.
If there is anything unique about gates, it's his obsessive desire to possess and dominate everything. Jobs and McNealy are content to do a few things well. But gates won't be content until he rules it all. Everything. The whole world.
Its quite funny to see linux, ipod, google, etc drive bill into fits of rage.
That may be true. But it's pretty sad that, for Bill, it's not enough to win; someone else has to lose. He hates sharing the stage. It's like Bill thinks all computers everywhere are his personal domain. There's probably medication available for that problem.
Napster-to-go says "Fill and refill your compatible MP3 player", which is a lie. It's not MP3. It's WMA with DRM.
I think that this section says a lot:
But Microsoft isn't exactly in fighting trim. Its ambitious new operating system, code-named Longhorn, is more than a year late, even after having been scaled back. Linux, the free operating system that Gates once scoffed at, is fighting Microsoft for share in both the server and desktop markets, forcing the company to do the unthinkable: offer customer discounts. Last year it had to spend $1 billion to rewrite thousands of lines of code to make its programs less susceptible to viruses. Its Xbox gaming console is winning raves from players but has yet to make serious money. Meanwhile, Apple has stolen the show in online music with its hugely popular iPod and iTunes Music Store. Plus, the recently released Firefox browser, which can be downloaded free, has forced Gates to reconstitute an Internet Explorer development team. Indeed, four years have passed since Microsoft released a piece of software that generated the kind of buzz Google seems to generate every month.
So Microsoft is competing with Linux on the overall OS, with Sony and Nintendo in the gaming market, with Apple for music related things, with Mozilla for browsers, and with Google (and Yahoo) for search. The battle is being fought on too many fronts. All of these companies that are succeeding in competing with Microsoft are succeeding because they're trying to do one thing well. They may have other projects they work on, but they devote themselves full out to that one arena in most cases. Apple isn't trying to write search engines. The Moz folks aren't getting into digital music. Too many fronts...
>"Microsoft can play its old game to compete with Linux and Apple. It has to play Google's game to compete with Google."
How many fronts can Microsoft take on, at once? They're used to competing in "steamroller mode" where they mobilize the company against a smaller (or larger but less focused, like IBM) competitor, and run them over. But now Linux and Google are recognized as major threats, Firefox and Apple are chipping away at market share, and OpenOffice is sitting in the wings, especially considering IBM's embedding it, and other such efforts. They can't mobilize the company against any one of these things without taking the finger off of the others.
If I were Microsoft, I'd have a small focus group figuring out how the company can survive and thrive as "just another highly successful company" rather than as "The Industry Dominator," because it just doesn't look to me as if they're going to be able to keep that position in the long run.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
Yeah, but none of those make real money for Microsoft. Profits made from
Office and Windows subsidize everything else that Microsoft does. This is
why Microsoft seems to desperate lately: their only two cash cows are under
the heaviest attack from OSS.
BTW, did anyone else notice that MS slashed their R&D budget? How do they
expect to thrive in new markets if they don't try new stuff? You can only
leverage a desktop monopoly so far...
*sigh* back to work...
I the only one smiling from ear to ear?
I'd be willing to wager that Microsoft's customers are pretty darned happy - everytime M$FT gets angry at the competition, their customers are rewarded with a vast new generation of ably-crafted products [often given away for free].
"Well, what google is doing is DoubleClick *10^100"
;-)
Wow, I was wondering why my browser was so slow! With that many cookies, I guess I must just be running low on RAM
"Does anyone else remember the days when Slashdot ranted daily"
Yep... I think that was... ah, let me check my watch...
The "Some people on Slashdot ranted about X, thus X has been proved to be useful only for the forces of darkest evil" line of logic isn't really all that sound, you realize.
"everyone's hunkydory with it because they *might* help runner-ups like OpenOffice or Firefox become more popular by morphing them into data collection mechanisms"
No, I'm OK with what Google does because they have a track record of doing the right thing. They support open source projects, they have never disclosed my personal information, they write damned good code, their services continue to benefit the state of the art and my life is a bit more productive because of them.
"Anyway, don't kid yourselves. Google is really an advertisement vendor"
OK.... and? Did you think no one had noticed what their revenue model was?!
"They want this data to build consumer profiles on you"
Targetted advertising is not a problem except in that it's a type of advertising. If you have a problem with ads, targetted ads should be no more objectionable, and at least in my case, they're slightly LESS objectionable.
If Google were to start selling that database to anyone with cash, then I'd be pretty irrate. Google has demonstrated, though, that they are committed to a more reasonable course of action. A lot of people get upset because Google put "Don't be evil," in their S-1, but keep in mind that the standard retort to "they are doing good so far," is that they have an obligation to stockholders and will HAVE to do anything they can to meet that obligation. That's not quite true. For example, if McDonalds got involved in the diamond trade, they might make more money, but they don't HAVE to try to do that because it's not in their business plan, and thus not in their SEC filings.
Google's anti-evil statement in their S-1 is a fair warning to investors (and they go into detail on this in their S-1) that they operate at a disadvantage by applying ethics. This shields them from the obligation to do "whatever it takes" to increase shareholder value. They still have to work on the stockholders' behalf, but only within those parameters.
"and probably governmental profiles too"
Oooh, "governmental"! Sounds spooky. Of course, even you aren't sure what you mean by that, and it's certainly a wild guess.
I am having a very hard time believing that your non-technical friends read the Terms and Conditions. This is something that I have never seen. The whole spyware industry is based on the fact that most people do not read or understand EULAs.
There are two kinds of sysadmins: paranoids and losers. I'm both kinds.
" Jumping from desktop search to Excel is a pretty good stretch of the imagination. I'm not really sure if that's the way the MSFT exec meant it."
.Net Notice anything? The both break the link between Microsoft and the X86. I would bet that Microsoft vision of the future is Microsoft XBox like systems tied to MSN using Network enabled applications to store files on Microsoft servers. Not to mention watching movies served from those servers and listening to music bought from those servers. There will come an end to must have upgrades to Windows. Computers are very close to doing what ever you want them to now. Microsoft can not expect a constant stream of new Windows and Office users. That is one reason they went into Games. People will always want a new game. With the end of the constant upgrade cycle the only way that they can keep the money flowing in is going to a computing as a services model. .net and the XBox360? Someday the x86 will run out of steam. It has already been hacked and extended to death. Microsoft has not had any luck using other ISAs until WindowsCE started to get some traction. They do not want the end of the X86 to be the end of Microsoft.
I think that is exactly what the mean. I think it shows more what Microsoft is planing than what Google is. Microsoft is seeing that Netscape was right after all. Windows is rapidly getting to the point of not mattering all that much. Many companies have moved from running on Windows to using the browser as the UI for applications. Gmail and Google maps have shown that Google are the masters of web based interfaces. Let's look at Two of Microsoft biggest projects. XBox360 and
Why the break from Intel with
Often what people fear is what they themselves are planing.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
I've always said this...
I don't mind commercials if it's for something I might actually buy.
I don't mind junk mail for products I might actually want.
I don't even mind telemarketers selling me something that I'm interested in.
I don't mind advertising when it's for stuff I'm interested in or curious about.
What I mind is having to sit through ads for "Desperate Housewives" and other pop/crap culture TV shows. What I mind is "American Idol" conspiracy theories on respectable news reporting web sites. What I mind is being hassled at dinner time to switch my long distance carrier. What I mind is getting junk mail for any Chevy product.
Yet, I get Dell's monthly/quarterly mini-mag all the time and I never fail to flip through it and review prices.
When I want to buy something on-line, I often hit www.google.com and type the item in and then click on the ads to check prices and on-line vendors.
Advertising isn't evil. It's just annoying when it's for stuff that you don't want. I wouldn't even mind spam if the spam I got was, first of all, not fully of elementary school grammar and spelling errors, and second of all, not insulting my intelligence. If I got spam for stuff I might actually buy, I'd object to it less.
So, if Google can find a way to target advertising at me for products that I am actually interested in, then more power to them.
Why do you think word-of-mouth is the best advertising?
You get the point. Word of mouth is highly directed personal advertising. If Google can reproduce that to some degree programmatically, I don't mind.
From a privacy perspective, I object to this data being collected without my knowledge, but that's not what they're doing. I _KNOW_ exactly what they can do with my information, and I continue to let them do it.
"I have never won a debate with an ignorant person." -Ali ibn Abi Talib
Yep. And the funny thing is that Google has a real chance to do what MS has been trying to ram down people's throats for years - namely, "sell" web-based applications. Difference is google would rather just put inobtrusive ads on your workspace, while MS wants you to subscribe. Easier and cheaper always win.
The other thing is the potential to integrate all your communication and work tools. Imagine better collaboration, documentation, and email sofware seamlessly integrated. Guarantee you Google's already working on it. How MS has avoided making Outlook better I have no idea. Guess it's that whole monopoly thing, they don't have to.
The question is how and when they roll out GMail. It has to be close - I use it all the time and love it. I imagine they're still refining the business model? When the public at large starts using that and realizes that it beats the crap out of everything else, and starts having their mail forwarded to their gmail accounts because it's better...google wins.
I this way, Google can jump OSS as the biggest threat to MS. Imagine people running all their apps as java apps (or similar) served by google. It's hardware-agnostic. It's OS-agnostic. Watch MS try making a TCO argument there:
This has the potential to do in a *non-evil* way everything MS tried to do between the combined nebulous efforts of Passport and the failed part of its .Net initiative. And people will love it.
FTA: Google has even had the nerve to set up an office five miles down the road from Microsoft's Redmond, Wash., headquarters. Its opening last November was supposed to be an invitation-only affair, but word spread and by 7 p.m. the place was swarming with dozens of uninvited Microsofties--casually, and sometimes not so casually, looking for work. The Google migration has gotten so bad, says a former Microsoft employee, that when he told his bosses and colleagues he was leaving earlier this year, "the first question out of their mouths was 'You're not going to Google, are you?' "
THIS is the real battle, not software, not market share, but people. I can't see any other reason why Google setup an office just down the road from Microsoft other than to siphon off their talent. When the industry believes the smartest and brightest are at Google and not Microsoft, confidence in products, market share and ultimately the future will follow.
Make no mistake, Bill is livid because Google is stealing sheep from his cherished flock of programmers.
Ruby on Rails Screencast
So Microsoft keeps telling me.
But where is all that stuff?
What important software is written in C#?
Windows? Linux? MS Office? Apache? Autocad? Photoshop? ... Nope, no C# in sight.
So where is it? All I've heard so far is a few ASP.NET websites and a few demos like calculators, etc. Nothing really impressive and nothing really important.
So what are you talking about?
That saying should be tatooed in reverse on the forehead of every CEO of every company that competes against Microsoft, so that every morning they look in the mirror and see that message in bold black ink.
The aggressiveness and will to succeed that you find in the CEOs of so many technology companies tends to go hand in hand with the sort of hubris that becomes an iron anchor. They succeed temporarily against Microsoft, get happy about it and crow to whomever will listen, and a few years later they get solidly trounced by the Beast of Redmond.
It has been proven over and over again that Microsoft succeeds against opponents who become complacent. Those that don't (Intuit is a good example) can fend off Microsoft's attacks. But I'm seeing signs that Google is already getting too full of themselves. If they're not paranoid of Microsoft, they're screwed.
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
"Somebody else took the plunge and was satisfied, thus allowing somebody whose opinion you probably respect to personally recommend a product/service"
That's the one I was thinking of. We don't trust a company that is telling us how great their product is because that is a conflict of interest. A friend isn't trying to get our money when they tell us how great product X is. Although there is the occasional person who is trying to justify buying something they regret by telling you how great it is.